Roopa Seshadri

Roopa Seshadri is a Senior Researcher at Chapin Hall. Her research interests include child health and welfare policy in the context of human services, especially as they pertain to vulnerable populations; disparities in preventive health care; and healthcare access and outcomes. She leads the evaluation of an initiative in Chicago Public Schools aimed at reducing teen pregnancy and the evaluation of Healthy Chicago Public Schools -- an implementation of the Community Transformation Grant. Other current projects include studies of families that are recipients of services from multiple state systems, understanding the population, poverty and neighborhood trends in Chicago and identifying indicators of child well-being – all projects are targeted towards informing service needs and allocation and measurements of services and programs. Her previous work includes studies of access to childhood immunization services and the potential barriers to utilization of available resources, and outcomes of traumatic injury as it relates to proximity to services. She has expertise in research study design, use of national survey and registry data, and application of statistical data analysis methodology to research and administrative data, specializing in health and welfare services. Prior to joining Chapin Hall, her work focused on health services and medical research. Dr. Seshadri holds a Ph.D. in Applied Statistics from the University of Memphis and an A.M. in Public Policy from the University of Chicago.